Tyler Green Modern Art Notes

Summer amusements, pulp-fiction style

Last night a reader sent over this JPEG.It’s a pulp fiction papberback cover, apparently from 1969.

I think it includes the most unlikely confluence of art references I’ve ever seen: The author shares his (pen) name with a former director of the National Gallery of Art. The title refers to a 14th-century Catholic cult-practice and to a practice frequently depicted in Italian art (and in a related story, I offer you this super NGA Bacchiacca featuring the flagellation of Christ). Finally, there’s a nearly naked woman standing in front of… a Robert Motherwell?!? What more could you want?

(Oh, you could want me to tell you what the cover promises there at the bottom, in red? You betcha: “She was Hollywood’s hottest sex goddess — until a killer cast her as the world’s most glamorous corpse.”)